Flick! Crackle.
It’s been a while since I wrote poetry, he wrote
in his mind. Drag. He imagined a wry smile
on his face—
“Oh my gaaaawd! Would you look at him!”
From another dark corner of his skull,
“Shakespeare in turmoil! Come look!—“
broken off in a cackle. Whatever; that one alw—
“Now he’s dismissing us! Look at the sneeeer!!
What a pretentious shit! Haaaa!” and the screeching
sound of laughter, bitter and mirthless.
Drag. The jackal’s not all wrong, he thought.
He never used to notice how the smoke
stinks; it smells bad. I don’t like it,
he observed to himself. Drag.
Chasing the noise of the jackal was a bleak silence,
like a faceless man. Or maybe it was, actually
—faceless thoughts, shapeless and meaningless.
Can a single syllable with no meaning
even exist, in your head? Can a tuneless sound?
Drag. “Always creating, always clawing, reaching,
forcing his smell, his strange flavor, on everything—
for what?! You think you’re better than us?”
Started as sniveling—ended with a scream. Drag.
For some reason, in his mind’s eye, there is a low wall
and a nicely trimmed green hedge, just to the right
of me—if I looked over, I would see it, he thinks,
knowing he wouldn’t—and it just seems
adult, responsible, grown up, to have that.
He wonders briefly whose house he is at, to have
such a careful guardian, who trims the hedges, but
he’s careful not to look, and prove it isn’t there.
Drag. The jackal has a point. Look at this disaster.
Why force strange flavors on a listless world?
Whatever. Drag. So it goes; sometimes life is like that.
Drop. Step. Gingerly pick up—I’ll have to wash
my hands, beard, clothes, for the smell, he thinks.
Toss!
like a faceless man. Or maybe it was, actually
—faceless thoughts, shapeless and meaningless.
Can a single syllable with no meaning
even exist, in your head? Can a tuneless sound?
Drag. “Always creating, always clawing, reaching,
forcing his smell, his strange flavor, on everything—
for what?! You think you’re better than us?”
Started as sniveling—ended with a scream. Drag.
For some reason, in his mind’s eye, there is a low wall
and a nicely trimmed green hedge, just to the right
of me—if I looked over, I would see it, he thinks,
knowing he wouldn’t—and it just seems
adult, responsible, grown up, to have that.
He wonders briefly whose house he is at, to have
such a careful guardian, who trims the hedges, but
he’s careful not to look, and prove it isn’t there.
Drag. The jackal has a point. Look at this disaster.
Why force strange flavors on a listless world?
Whatever. Drag. So it goes; sometimes life is like that.
Drop. Step. Gingerly pick up—I’ll have to wash
my hands, beard, clothes, for the smell, he thinks.
Toss!
December 2020
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